The net spend thing is somewhat misleading. Whilst we do, we still spend very little overall because of the lack of sales due to the owners unwillingness to sell while they still add value. Im sure I read that Boro have spent £50m whilst earning £70m in recent years.

Kaminski Rankin Costello Ayala Phillips Pickering Travis Buckley Markanday Dack Dolan Brereton Subs: Pears, Carter, Wharton, Edun, Garrett, Hedges, Szmodics, Leonard, Gallagher

No strikeforce containing Gallagher would make a particularly good strikeforce.

No, probably not, I have never said otherwise, it is just unfortunate. But that would not be an excuse to not bring in a striker at all. Youve even said yourself that we should have a big shortlist of potential strikers, if those 2 are eventually unobtainable, surely there is no reason not to get one of the others on the list. That is something you just bat off because you cant bring yourself to critique Broughton and co.

What is your question that you want answering? If we have a huge list of potential strikers and if we get none of them, IF because obviously maybe we still will. Then there is NO excuse to not get any of a list that you have presumed to be 28-30 players deep. I've never claimed that signing players is easy, but we have spent money on hiring a director of football and a team of supposed recruitment analysts etc. They should give us an advantage no?

You yourself said that we should have a big shortlist of various targets that fit the criteria we want. We have gambled on 2 targets that we havent managed to conclude which is a gamble. IF we dont get a striker at all, that isnt excusable considering aforementioned shortlist. If we dont sign a striker its simply unacceptable, end of.

See my last post above. If we have got such a long shortlist, then we have 18-28 more to go at and there are no excuses not to get one in. I said IF we don't sign another striker. If we do, obviously we can judge base on who he is. But if not, they have royally fucked up, yet you have already decided that you will accept the excuses regardless.

It's not about the details of the individual deals, ultimately it will come down to which players are signed at the end of the window. We have taken a bit of a gamble by sticking to the deals for Undav and this Kone right until the end of the window, we have made a conscious decision to do that and thus if for whatever reason you don't get them deals done then your gamble has backfired and you deserve all of the criticism that comes your way. When it comes to the rest of the season and we need a goal, we can't bring on "decided to stay with his parent club" or "the parent club changed their mind" when we need a goal so we will lose points with our 2 current poor quality strikers, one of whom struggled to score last season in non league. The main problem is from the owners obviously, our assets run down their contracts and we are left looking to beg to borrow players. But Broughton and his recruitment team also get lots of blame. If we get nobody, then even if these excuses would stick with the strikers, even if we did sign a striker it would leave us short in midfield.

FFP and similar rules being brought in as excuses for lack of spending. When we are letting millions go down the drain, that excuses ceases to exist.

Ok, so to clarify, even if we don't sign anyone else, you won't be putting any questions (metaphorically) towards Broughton and the recruitment team? The transfer market is about identifying players that are realistic, and the longer in the window you leave it, you risk putting your eggs in one or two baskets with no back up plan if they fall through. There are always bloody excuses, its never our fault.

The quote in your post looks quite friendly to me, not the same as saying "you know nothing." Just a bit of friendly leg pulling which surely is par for the course with dodgy info, just as when "ITK's" are right they are the first to quote themselves to point it out. I don't think its healthy to have them as a protected species!

And the owners. 2 winters in a row when we have been in good league positions and they have gone into hiding.

There are a lot of people online staunchly defending Broughton on the basis that it is down to Lorient and it is out of his control. I am sorry but that is bollocks. The individual deal may not be down to him but he will have overseen the decision to focus on that deal regardless of how close it gets to the end of the window. If you put all of your eggs in one basket, you have to get that deal over the line. Like I said prior, my blame certainly doesn't solely lie with Broughton should we end up with no new striker as expected, I can't look past the fact that this sort of shit always happens under Venkys. But he certainly takes a huge share of it.

The common denominator regarding repeated occasions on which stuff like this happens is Venkys, make no mistake. Tomasson, Broughton, Mowbray, Waggott and so on, change them around and deals still fall through. Working on a pittance because the owners dont want to sell players prior to their contracts expiration, asking to beg, steal and borrow, throw in the likely delays to India and this is what you got. Never heard of this player but hardly a great track record. @chaddyrovers you have stormed in as you usually do calling out people for being "negative." You seem to have assumed that we WILL get a striker as one of 2 signings. If we don't get them, at that point will you question Broughton and the recruitment team? My prediction is no signings.

Undav is seemingly an out and out number 9, Gelhardt I have seen a few times and he is small and nimble and plays just off. They aren't similar.

Apologies, Travis with Buckley.

You would think that a well organised recruitment team would have a number of options all of the same style to fit the profile they want. Strange to have a big target man and more of a number 10 type on the same list.

Yep, seems to be nonsense.

The supposed ITK's on here this window have been particularly wide of the mark it seems.

Hope we take this seriously, would love to go further and some big hitters are already out. Would personally swap the centre backs for Ayala and Phillips as Wharton again was shaky and Carter is clumsy himself. I also think that Dolan deserves to start over Gallagher, Travis for Buckley and if fit, Markanday for Hedges. So a few changes but more to improve the team, rather than weaken it. I don't want to see Edun, Garrett, Vale and Pears all in.

I doubt it, I may be wrong but I think you have to be registered for the initial game. The fact that Gelhardt was one of our wanted options perhaps lends itself to the theory that our recruitment is a bit haphazard considering how different he is to Undav. You think that Morton has warranted being essentially the first name on the team sheet? Ok.

I wouldn't worry about attitude as @chaddyrovershas assured us that we will get someone with a better attitude than Obafemi.

If you want a glamour tie on TV, surely a big tie that 100% will be on TV would be preferable ie City or United, allowing you to watch players of the ilk of De Bruyne and Haaland or Rashford and Casemiro in the process, with a bigger crowd. If he priority is progression, surely you want to avoid Premier League teams. They should have taken advice from Venkys and allowed the likes of Cucurella etc to run their contracts down.

Why does it have to come down to people being negative when they try and break down a players career? You think that anyone we sign will automatically be good, surely the truth is in the middle. There will always be examples of players who have suddenly found a home but it is more likely that a players career to date is a good guideline to what you are signing. He didn't feature at the World Cup, he had some poor spells in the English lower leagues, he did score a reasonable amount in Holland but it was not the top division, his 2 seasons in Belgium were mixed and his overall goal tally in France is poor, albeit at a higher standard than the Championship. Like anyone on here I am merely basing this on his goal record but it is the only thing we can really discuss. Anyway, it's only a rumour, he hasn't signed nor has there been a concrete link.

Will Ugbo be joining the 3 signings that we had ready to sign and push the button on? And will he join in addition to a player who has got minutes for Juventus very recently? Will take with a pinch of salt at this stage, the whole window has seemingly been one of trying to conjure magic on a non-existent budget whilst the elephant in the room of our (in the summer) £8m plus forward continues to simultaneously run down any value left whilst being bang out of form.